What car events happen during the week of Tokyo Auto Salon?  Where are the best meets?  How do you get there?  If you’re not sure of what to do or where to go, check out this post for annual events that happen every year before the show. 

 

Part 3 – Car Life

In the last post, we explored what car life is like hours before Tokyo Auto Salon 2017 (TAS2017) at Makeover Co., Ltd. in Konosu located in Saitama prefecture.  If you missed it, check out the post here.   Enrique and I continue car life in Japan by heading back to Tokyo to meet up Joseph, aka @Shihtake , whom just landed into NRT.  Our plan was to rest for a bit, grab a bite to eat, and head out to the car meets.

What car events happen during the week of Tokyo Auto Salon?  Where and when are car meets in Tokyo?  How do you get to the meets in Tokyo? 
There are about 2-3 public meets that people attend during the week of Tokyo Auto Salon.  The first one is the annual RWB pre-TAS meeting in Roppongi Hills.  Porsches start arriving around 6PM until about 8PM.  I’ve been to 2 of these gatherings in the past so seeing a bunch of RWB’s is not something out of the norm for me, but is always an awesome sight to see.  If you’re a RWB fan boy or car enthusiast, I’d recommend stopping by this meet for about an hour.

You can follow the the Official RWB Instagram page for more info on events…

Just look for the Hard Rock Cafe in Roppongi and you will find the RWB meeting spot.

We arrived to the meet kinda late so most of the RWBs were hard parked…

Once we arrived, I caught up with some of the Wekfest guys and JoeyLee from the Chronicles. 

Beautiful Bright Red 964 sporting a huge wing like RWB Rotana.

The best colors on RWB’s are red in my opinion like this 993… 

The RWB line up on the side entrance of the Hard Rock Cafe parking lot.

There is a random garage space located in the parking lot where some RWB’s park.  From what I remember, they were selling merchandise out of here.

The meet parking lot is really dark…

And lots of spectators and people get in the way of your shots if your lens isn’t wide enough, so I’d strong recommend bringing a tripod or a fast lens… 

Spectators from different parts of the world attend to document this meet.

Taken around 7:30PM… a fashionably late entrance for RWB Rauh Passion. 

Momoki Yamane, owner of this yellow 964 , transported RWB Nathalie all the way from Hokkaido by truck and ferry to this annual event… it’s about a 19 hrs from Hokkaido to the Hard Rock Cafe… 

It was close to 8PM and we got word that the Super Street meet in Odaiba was already packed…

So Enrique, Joseph, and I took our last shots of the night meeting in Roppongi.

 

Parked outside the lot was this white Levin with ‘Rough World’ on the windshield…

I’m not 100% sure, but this Levin probably belongs to Nojima-san...

If you’re not sure who Nojima-san is, he owns the infamous “Real of the World” AE86 and paints Nakai-san’s RWB cars. 

The next meet I’d recommend is the ‘Fresh Tokyo Car Meet’ by Super Street and Hardcore Japan.   The meet location is usually not announced until a day or two before the meet.  Reason for this was so cops would not shut down the parking garage…

Super Street has a huge following worldwide and their meet shows it…

Using Google maps you can directions from the RWB meet to the Fresh Tokyo Car meet.  You can click on the photo for directions.

As soon as we got off the train, you could hear the cars from a mile away….

Cars were parked outside the parking garage…

Not sure if this is a real Mugen Honda Civic Type R, but does look pretty good on SL’s. 

Cars lined up outside on the street… this was around 8:45PM and the garage was already closed…

SuperStreet guys definitely know how to throw a meet…

So much camber on this WRB BRZ…

We finally made our way into the garage and first thing that caught my eye was @sardonyx3‘s NSX on black TE37’s. 

Last year, this was the prime spot for Jun’s Blue Advance NSX and @Sardonyx3’s white NSX.  Looks like they were replaced with some Honda Fits.

People came as early as 5:30PM to get primo spot parking…

Walking around, I got to see some familiar faces… Abbitt, Minh, Vinh, and more from Royal Origin.  Enrique on the left taking in what a Super Street car meet is like.  

Sexy foodie boy here is Minh.

Hachiroku Levin Coupe with itb’s on some equips…  there were a lot of hachiroku’s…. alot… you’ll see what I mean…

Not usually a fan of the Abflug Kit on the Supra but this one isn’t bad…

Evan or @wandering_texan is from Houston, TX now residing in Yokohama for work…. he’s also our ride to meets out in Daikoku-Futo.

His chariot of choice, RB Stagea.

There were a lot of R32’s and you could tell if they were owned by U.S. military guys… the ‘Y’ on white plates… you’ll see what I mean in a bit.

Clean FD lowered on some 3 piece wheels…

Looks like Sarto RB kit on this blue E36 M3….

Boosted S52/M52 setup showing a good size turbo… looks like fun.

A pretty good Calsonic R32 GTR replica. 

So low, so stance.

Red Altezza looks like he/she drifts… but car looks too clean.

Guess this Datsun Sunny isn’t really JDM and is really Hardcore.

I’ve never seen this kit for the 350z before… Z-Project.

Looked them up and they debuted at TAS 2015…

Another look at the Toyota Celica…

Really aggressive stance on this ND Miata MX-5.

Of course decorations for cars are ok…

CBY AE86 with really wide wheels… clean.

Imagine if that woman was the owner of this Chaser….

Two tone red / black looks good on gold wats… see what I mean about hachirokus…

Really nice Supra on bronze CE28’s…

Another white Trueno coupe rolling through… check out the Y plate….

Toyota Crown and and Infiniti M stance out in their parking spots…

The windshield banner reads “Photographer”… guess he’s a photographer too…

Super clean and low FC rolling around…

Car Modify Wonder kit S15…

On some Work Emotion wheels…

The 2nd floor of the meet had about 15+ hachirokus…

Oh Japan…

You guys are too wild for me…

Female owned S14…

Team Perversity yo.

Still got tire stickers on…

“ROLAND – WE WANT OURSELF JUST THE WAY WE ARE”

Stanced out ND Miata MX-5 on some 3 piece steelies….

These guys were everywhere!

Really nice Libery Walk Gran Turismo on some Rotiform wheels…

Unfortunately, my full car shot was blurry… 85mm life for the lose.

This NSX sat on the 2nd floor… ‘Y’ plate…

I actually like this Mk3 Supra…

Squad of R32 GTR’s / ‘Y’ plates…

Seems like all the military guys all have nice cars…

Hopefully, I answered some of your questions about the Tokyo car meets during Tokyo Auto Salon.  If you have any questions, just hit me up on Instagram or by email.  Thanks for checking out this post.

Danh Phan
http://www.danhphan.com
http://www.danhphanphoto.wordpress.com
http://www.instagram.com/dtphan

Gear:
Nikon D750
Sigma 35mm f1.4
Nikon 85mm f1.8